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OK, you misread the mandate and it's led you and the party to the brink of disaster. Well, these things happen. But when the going gets tough, the tough get going and you have always been tough. So now what?

I have two words for you today: jobs and Clinton.

While some of your base voted for overwhelming change, your guy is in the White House because the people hungered for rational competence -- they like the American system pretty well but want to see it more competently managed. McCain seemed hot, bothered and erratic in the fall of 08; your guy looked unflappable and collected. He seemed like a better captain for the coming storm.

The recession has been much, much more devastating than you guys predicted (OK, OK, it could have been an absolute disaster without quick action, but you guys made some injudicious predictions about the unemployment rate that still haunt you today). That undermines faith in the president's competence; more, as the public uneasiness has grown, the president has seemed to focus more and more on a health care bill the public likes less and less.

People want jobs; feel their pain and move heaven and earth to give them what they want. Jobs, jobs, jobs, jobs, jobs, jobs. Get on the right side of that one and the whole outlook begins to turn brighter.

Your second word for the day is Clinton: Bill Clinton. Your guy isn't the second coming of Lincoln or Roosevelt -- at least not yet and not now. He's the second coming of Bill Clinton -- if he's lucky. That is, he's a Democratic president in a center right country. He's not going to change the game; not enough of the voters want that to happen. The terrain of American politics isn't on your side; you've got to learn to tack and shift with the wind.

Now you guys are right that the Clinton/Blair 'third way' stuff hasn't and probably can't deliver the kind of leadership countries like the US and the UK require at this time in our history. But just because Tony Blair's third way has passed its sell-by date doesn't mean you have a lot of viable alternatives -- and unfortunately none of you in the White House has time for the kind of deep re-think that progressives generally need. For now at least you are going to have to manage opportunistically: goose the economy, manage the wars, triangulate your way through the social and ideological issues that divide the country. This probably means a horrifyingly Clintonian focus on doing lots of little things rather than a few big ones.

Things can change; a second term may open up some new opportunities. And if the president recaptures the political high ground as the economy picks up (and, hopefully, the deficit goes down), you can take another look at where you stand. But for now, get used to it: your guy has turned from an aspiring Lincoln to an aspiring Clinton. (Or Grover Cleveland, if you prefer: another Democrat who managed to run the country during a Republican era.)

Finally, don't telegraph your strategy. Don't tell people you are doing this; just do it.

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